And the Giraffe Takes Blackmagic Cinema Camera for a Ride in Music Video for "Sorry"

For 'And the Giraffe,' an indie rock band based in Nashville, TN, making music videos is a blast. They love to put a video story on top of the story they tell in their lyrics, and connect with more people in doing so. The video for the band's latest single, "Sorry," was shot while the bandmates rode bicycles around Los Angeles, and according to band member Nick Roberts, the video turned out better than they had hoped, was one of their most fun projects to date and couldn't have been done without the Blackmagic Cinema Camera.

A Different Point of View

The group shot its very first music video in LA, which was directed by Nick's high school friend, Harrison Sanborn. When it came time to shoot its second video, for the single "Sorry," Nick and bandmate Josh Morris knew they wanted Harrison to direct again. After kicking around ideas, the group decided to bike ride through various parts of LA and incorporate a unique point of view by mounting a camera to the bicycle and pointing it at the bike rider's face.

Harrison, who is also a musician himself, grew up around camera equipment, as his father and grandfather produced stabilized camera systems for helicopters and aerial photographs. Although Harrison grew up with a good understanding of camera technology, it wasn't until he was in his late teens that he began to take filmmaking seriously.

Today, he lives in LA and works on both music videos and feature films. During his annual trip to NAB in April of 2012, Harrison discovered the Blackmagic Cinema Camera. The Blackmagic Cinema Camera features a high resolution 2.5K sensor, super wide 13 stops of dynamic range and 12-bit RAW uncompressed and compressed ProRes and DNxHD file formats.

"For Blackmagic Design to introduce a camera that shoots 12-bit RAW Cinema DNG at higher than HD resolution, that's a pretty big deal," said Harrison. "It's hugely advantageous for filmmakers who are on a budget or who need a camera with a more versatile form factor. This camera is something that a lot of independent filmmakers have been waiting for."

Letting Creative Juices Flow

The band traveled to LA and after deciding on their approach to the video, they set out to mount the Blackmagic Cinema Camera to one of their bicycles. After realizing the cost of renting the proper rigging equipment that they needed grossly exceeded their very modest budget, they got creative and used some spare rigging equipment that Harrison had to make a stable enough mount.

The filming process was simple. Harrison recorded the music video footage in ProRes 422 HQ format because he knew they would not have access to any sort of DIT or transfer, and he wanted to get an extended amount of recording time. The shoot took two days and covered the entire city of Los Angeles and the nearby area of Coyote Dry Lake. They simply recorded to their SSDs, imported the footage, checked it and catalogued it.

"I was very happy with how the video turned out and how the Blackmagic Cinema Camera allowed us to tell our story in an easy and interesting way without needing a massive amount of production," said Harrison.

The Right Tool For The Job

"I couldn't have shot the 'Sorry' video with another camera and gotten the same amazing image quality," said Harrison. "It was small enough and high enough quality for this particular production. It has a huge amount of dynamic range and a level of sharpness and resolution that is much higher than something of a comparable size. It was an obvious choice for this video."

"We were very fortunate to have a Blackmagic Cinema Camera at our disposal for the shoot, and for everything else, we made the best out of what we had," added Nick. "Most of our budget went to renting bicycles and a uHaul truck to drive the few hundred miles across California. Our video is proof that no matter the budget, it's definitely possible to make something you're proud of."